charles barrow's writing

I recently watched actors Aidan Turner and Toni Collette on the Graham Norton show, and they both mentioned how often they checked the time to see it was 11:11. They both said that it happened more often than would seem likely, and had no explanation as to why it should happen with this combination of numbers more than any other. It was fascinating to hear other people talk about this so publicly, on television, because the same thing has been happening to me for years. It happened again this morning, which prompted me to post this. I have puzzled in the past, why and how it should be that I so often glance at my watch or a clock at this exact time but I've never figured out why. After watching the Norton show, I decided to Google 11:11 and quickly wished I hadn't - Global Shopping Festival, Uri Geller's theory of 11 parallel universes, a message from the angels, and many more bizarre theories. I've decided that from now on, when it happens again, I will just accept

I was out walking and the sight of this beautifully elegant stand of foxgloves stopped me dead in my tracks. Not literally, luckily, but it could have done. Every part of the foxglove plant is poisonous. A fatal dose would stop your heart in, well, a heartbeat. Handy to know if you want to bump someone off, in a story of course. Look no further for evidence than crime queen Agatha Christie who used this method to kill victims in several of her stories. Elegant but deadly, then. The foxgloves too. Photo is the author's own